Chambery, France (Bicycling.com) — Most of Vincent Lavenu’s life in cycling has been about survival. Be it as a cyclist or as a team director, he has spent much of his time in the sport just trying to make the cut. But as he stood on the stage of the Salle de Phare in his native Chambery, France, on Wednesday, he struggled to hold back the tears as some of the biggest names in the sport celebrated his 20th year as a team director.

Few here, however, ever imagined that Lavenu, today director of the French AG2R team, would one day become one of the sport’s leading team directors.

Lavenu was a plucky rider at best. His career reached its pinnacle when he was a water-bottle carrier for 1987 Tour de France champion Stephen Roche on the Fagor team. But his racing days ended in obscurity on the humble Mosoca outfit in 1991.

That same year he wrote up a business plan and managed to attract Chazal, a regional meat producer in the French Alps, to sponsor his first professional team. Run on a shoestring budget of $60,000, Lavenu hired mostly unemployed professionals, offering them France’s minimum wage and the hope of least one more year as a cyclist. The team competed in the shadows of the world’s top races but managed to score a handful of victories its first year, and an invitation to the 1993 Tour de France.

But even when Lavenu scored a sponsorship with Petit Casino in 1996, the team’s existence remained fragile. To meet his budget that year, Lavenu launched a national campaign in which he asked people to contribute $20 to support the team. The move was considered a stroke of genius and also an act of desperation. But it worked.

Although at times mocked for his makeshift style, his entrepreneurial instincts impressed his title sponsor and it quadrupled the team’s budget in 1997, allowing Lavenu to hire international stars such as Olympic champion Pascal Richard and a certain neo-pro named Alexandre Vinokourov.

Jan Kirsipuu, left, with Lavenu at the 2006 Tour de France. (James Startt)

Lavenu’s teams have scored wins in classics like the Amstel Gold Race (Rolf Jaerman) and Paris-Tours (Jacky Durand) and 11 stage victories in the Tour de France. In addition, Jaan Kirsipuu wore the yellow jersey for six days in the 1999 Tour while Italian Rinaldo Nocentini held it for eight in 2009.

“Who would ever have guessed,” Bernard Thevenet said to Bicycling in Chambery. Thevenet, who won the Tour de France in 1975 and 1977, directed Lavenu on the RMO team in 1987.

“When I saw him start out with that little Chazal team, I said to myself, ‘He’ll never last.’ But he really wanted it.”

“I’m just tenacious,” Lavenu said. “That’s probably what helped me get through my years as a cyclist and now as a director.

“When I want something I don’t back down.”

He added, jokingly: “That has helped me a lot personally, but it sure can make life difficult for those around me.”

Jaan Kirsipuu

Undoubtedly, the rider most associated with Lavenu has been Estonian Jaan Kirsipuu, who first rode with Lavenu on the Chazal team and won 130 races on Lavenu’s various teams before his first retirement in 2006.

“Lavenu’s strength is his genuine human quality,” Kirsipuu said. “He’s really attached to his riders. He’s really attached to his staff. He is really faithful.”

Kirsipuu said Lavenu had a real opportunistic sense, which pushed riders like Christophe Agnolutto to win the Tour of Switzerland and guys like Cyril Dessel and Christophe Riblon to win stages in the Tour de France.

For Christian Prudhomme, director of the Tour de France, who first interviewed Lavenu as a journalist, it is his “sense of the collective” that has impressed him the most.

“In every race the team really goes after the team classification,” Prudhomme said. “You can tell there is a real family spirit with all of his teams.”

As the event honoring Lavenu in Chambery came to a close, the AG2R riders boarded the TGV, France’s high-speed train, for another official presentation in Paris on Thursday, after which Lavenu’s 21st season as a director would officially get under way.

“I won’t do another 20,” Lavenu said. “Physically it is just too demanding.